Getting better at Jungling

I've been playing for a year and have been playing a lot of ranked solo queue, and have been playing with a ranked team.
I consider myself a decent jungler but I feel like my map presence is no where near it can be.
I usually end up positive and most of the time i snowball my top lane, but it feels like there is always one lane i neglect, or if i gank to much, i fall far behind.
My summoner name is Skarndaddy, all the recent matches of lolking are normal draft practice games with my team.
If i could get some tips or some insight from more experienced junglers that would be fantastic.

Last edited by LolretKJ; 2012-11-20 at 09:41 AM.

Originally Posted by Proberly

Oh would you now? It truly is amazing how many heroic people we have wasting their time on internet.

It's all about understanding the situation. Sounds easy but it's very hard

Only gank when there is a high chance of success (I guess you know it already but I can't stress it enough: You don't need to kill someone for a gank to be succesful!), try to get in the other junglers mind and abuse him (counterjungle him when he shows himself, anticipate his ganks and counter them) and never stop farming.

I doubt that really helps you but it's all about experience. Keep playing and you'll get a feeling for the jungle

Tell your laners to ward their jungle entries, or slightly within their jungle, so you always have a general idea of where he is. Diamondprox is one of the best players who knows how to manage this imo, making him (or them) sick countergankers.

For example: Your mid has warded their Wraiths so that you can just see their jungler pass the bush to/past Red. If he has high HP and there is a chance they might catch your top, you might want to go top. Or, depending on the situation, you might want to go and invade with your top/mid.

Having vision and responding to this could mean you don't actually gank, but countergank giving you the element of surprise, possibly kills and probably the life of a team mate.

One thing about jungle that makes it completely different from any other position is that it is more instinct based but also the position that gets blamed more than any other. Map presence is something I'm pretty good at in the jungle, albeit in lane I'm a bit shitty at map presence but that's because I never play much else other than jungle. I usually play support if I don't get the jungle position in solo queue. Honestly just look around the map while moving to your next camp... Don't auto path and just let your guy go there.

I just honestly look at the minimap a lot when I'm playing jungle, just look down there and keep an eye on your movement towards the next camps etc. Jungle is my favorite position since it's very rogue like, if you knew me when it comes to gaming in general... I always choose the rogue-like character/champion. In WoW a rogue was my main, in Skyrim it was a Khajiit with sneaky prowess (OP), and in LoL I jungle.

I think a lot of it comes down to checking who the enemy jungler is and check that minimap constantly.

I've been playing for a year and have been playing a lot of ranked solo queue, and have been playing with a ranked team.
I consider myself a decent jungler but I feel like my map presence is no where near it can be.
I usually end up positive and most of the time i snowball my top lane, but it feels like there is always one lane i neglect, or if i gank to much, i fall far behind.
My summoner name is Skarndaddy, all the recent matches of lolking are normal draft practice games with my team.
If i could get some tips or some insight from more experienced junglers that would be fantastic.

I have done the same thing, and yelled at for it. Some people don't understand, sometimes one lane needs more attention then others.

As Duronos said, it's all instinct. You need to decide where your presence would be better served at the time. Always keep your eyes on the minimap. Unless I'm fighting someone, my eyes never leave my minimap. Always keep moving unless killing camps. I have been told by opponents I have an annoying habit of being everywhere at once. lol If I gank one lane, after the gank is over, I immediately head to the other side of the map in case that lane tries to push, thinking I'm at a near by jungle camp near the lane I had just ganked.

I have had some games where I never went bot for like 10 mins though lol.

Jungling can also be a thankless job, and you get blamed for anything that goes wrong.

I'm the minister of mistakes. I'm the shaman of sh*tstorms. If there was a f**k-up pope. I'd have a 3 foot hat!

When arguing online I like to use big words. Because by the time they're done googling it, they have forgotten what their point was.

1.) Vision is key- see above
2.) Timing of ganks based on lane pushing
2a.) Lanes ebb and flow, if top is pushing most would say go somewhere else; but usually I like to hang around top and countergank
2b.) Something I have noticed people underestimate is creep damage- you could jump in as their lane pushes, or you can wait until theres less creep because they do a shit ton early game if the wave is big
3.) Bot lane is the toughest to gank, often time its more productive to just farm or counter jungle

Finding a balance between ganking and farming takes a while to get used to. You can't be everywhere, so one lane will always feel neglected. If you do good early you can pull one lane ahead and leave it alone for the rest of the game unless they lose the lead you gave them. Most of the time at least one of your lanes will not need help anyway, so you can ignore them till they need or ask for help.

Vision is important, but it's so easy to predict jungler movement that it's not as important as it used to be. Unless the enemy jungler is inexperienced, a manaless jungler should start red and go for a level 2 gank, blue starters will gank at 3 or 4, so around 3:40 is when you should start watching for ganks from them (As support this is when I drop a ward).

Counter-ganking is really difficult, so unless your on someone like Shen or Alistair who can just completely screw up a gank, I would suggest focusing on counter-jungling while the enemy jungler is ganking. With good timing you can really screw them over and take a few buffs.

That's another thing, learn buff timers. Almost 7 minutes? Start getting ready for blue spawn. Work with your teammates so they can force the jungler to a lane while you steal his buffs.

Some junglers are fantastic duelists. Double buff Darius, Lee Sin, or Trundle are a force to be reckon with. Use this to your advantage and hunt down the enemy jungler in his jungle.

Jungling is probably the most complex rule when it comes to the amount of control you have over different areas and is my favorite role. Just stick at it and you'll eventually pick up and learn the skills you'll need to jungle.

Stay busy, essentially. Learn to manage your time. You should be either ganking, farming, counter jungling, or going for objectives. This goes with learning when buffs are up, as previously mentioned. Oh yeah, and pings are your friend. Just assume people don't look at chat, because a lot of players don't, or they might not be at the exact moment you're going in on a gank, but pinging should grab their attention right away.

I've been playing for a year and have been playing a lot of ranked solo queue, and have been playing with a ranked team.
I consider myself a decent jungler but I feel like my map presence is no where near it can be.
I usually end up positive and most of the time i snowball my top lane, but it feels like there is always one lane i neglect, or if i gank to much, i fall far behind.
My summoner name is Skarndaddy, all the recent matches of lolking are normal draft practice games with my team.
If i could get some tips or some insight from more experienced junglers that would be fantastic.

Jungler is the hardest and most nerve-wrecking position to play, imho + you're constantly the scapegoat for people who push 24/7 with no wards, get ganked and lose their lanes hard.

I always struggle to keep farming and meaningful ganking/pressuring at the same time and it seems so luck dependent in solo queue . . .

I guess you just need a really good instinct for situations and a lot of knowledge of the game in general.

In solo Queues I have found that you should play the gank heavy junglers because randoms always expect you to always gank. This makes life easier.

Counter Jungling is a risky thing, it all depends on how aware their mid and other lanes are. Sometimes a simple invade where you catch their jungler off guard can turn ugly fast if they are aware. Of course if your laners are awake and follow it's not so bad. However without premades it's incredibly risky and you shouldn't enter their jungle without a strong escape/flash.

Ganking does not always NEED to end up with a kill, just hurting their laner enough so that he has to turtle can be enough to give your laner a significant advantage.
You can't be a god and save all three lanes if they are all losing miserably. You can try and rarely succeed but if they are equally skilled. It is very unlikely. You can maybe save one or two lanes and hope they snowball hard enough that the other lane can recover.

I've had games where I counter-ganked top (because I saw it coming), gave our top a double kill and then get sworn at from bot for not ganking (Typed while hitting their tower). You will get shat on a lot by your team mates. It's a main reason why I prefer jungling with premades because they tend to A) listen to your warnings, B) Setup lane ganks better, C) not whine for a gank every 10 seconds. D) Tend to help more with counter jungling.

Hard to give advice with the new jungle so close. The thing about the jungle farm(and i tested this) is that even if all you do is farm all game you're still not going to have much more gold then a support, ie you will be between a support and a carry. This means come late game you'll be very lack luster in team fights. However an extra person in any lane early is devastating so at the start I'd suggest putting a fairly large amount of ganks pre-lane. You might not get a lot of kills however you can force other lanes behind and give you lanes an advantage.

When i do play jungle i NEED TO KNOW WHERE THE WARDS ARE. if there is a ward in a tri bush bot and ur on purple team you can either lane gank/river gank(this is less successful)

same goes with top, most top only wards the top tri bush(if ur on blue) so if you river gank or lane gank it will be a much successful gank.

counter jungling really depends on which character you are playing, mundo,shyv are amazing at counter since they are fast jungle clearer. if you have spare smite up smite the blue ghost and run away :P. i dont really like counter jungling enemy wolves since its really deep into enemy side and its very high risk low reward outcome imo unless enemy jungler is dead

and finally you need to know how far/close your ganking lane is being pushed so you know where to gank properly

When i do play jungle i NEED TO KNOW WHERE THE WARDS ARE. if there is a ward in a tri bush bot and ur on purple team you can either lane gank/river gank(this is less successful)

same goes with top, most top only wards the top tri bush(if ur on blue) so if you river gank or lane gank it will be a much successful gank.

counter jungling really depends on which character you are playing, mundo,shyv are amazing at counter since they are fast jungle clearer. if you have spare smite up smite the blue ghost and run away :P. i dont really like counter jungling enemy wolves since its really deep into enemy side and its very high risk low reward outcome imo unless enemy jungler is dead

and finally you need to know how far/close your ganking lane is being pushed so you know where to gank properly

I tend to play tricky junglers like Shaco because of that in solo queue, there are so many places to sneak up on the enemy they can't ward it. You should see some footage of my favorite place to deceive from... Though that's a big secret us Shaco players try to keep secret.

I tend to play tricky junglers like Shaco because of that in solo queue, there are so many places to sneak up on the enemy they can't ward it. You should see some footage of my favorite place to deceive from... Though that's a big secret us Shaco players try to keep secret.

Play Hecarim and pull out the most straight forward ganks ever. Post-6, just run straight down the lane. The enemy will be so shocked they won't be able to react. It's really fun too.

No idea if this helps but have you tried Amumu in the jungle? I've just recently started jungling mainly because I enjoy playing him so much. He's pretty speedy, his ganks are easy to pull off and all his damage is AOE. I find getting round to every lane is really easy with him because of how quick he is and how easy his ganks are to pull off.

The problem with amumu is he is VERY blue dependant first clear. That..... And u can basically steal his blue 60% of the time. Definitely a good pick.... But it team has to love u. Also is almost always banned in ranked.... Poor little guy